A well-documented history of the effort to control nuclear weapons.
From two nuclear weapons in the world, 80 years ago, to 12,500 warheads around the globe today.
The development of nuclear weapons divided the world both militarily and technologically into the haves and have-nots, as Harvard historian Plokhy writes. In 1945, the only “have” was the United States, but the Soviets, Britain, and France quickly developed their own weapons, creating what Winston Churchill called a “balance of terror,” with fear being the leading factor in efforts to control the use of atomic weapons and the proliferation of nuclear materials and technology. Treaty negotiation efforts began with a recognition of mutually assured destruction, or MAD—the reality that any country using a nuclear weapon will almost certainly be countered by another, leaving both countries in ruins. That mindset shifted in the 1980s to “mutually assured survival,” a strategic concept where nations prioritize cooperation and coexistence to avoid nuclear war. Ronald Reagan and Mikhail Gorbachev signed several treaties reducing the number of nuclear weapons in both arsenals and even eliminating entire classes of weapons. Both men were motivated by a desire for a stable international order and by visions of the aftermath of any nuclear weapons exchange (Reagan’s from the movie The Day After, Gorbachev’s from the reality of Chernobyl). The spirit of mutually assured survival seemed to indicate that the nuclear arms race was over, or at least greatly diminished. But by 1996, amid growing international tensions and increasing levels of fear and distrust, only two-thirds of United Nations member nations signed the Comprehensive Nuclear Test Ban Treaty, with India, Pakistan, and North Korea among the naysayers. All three now have their own bombs, and other nations and nongovernmental “rogue nations” have the capability to build their own nuclear weapons. This “new international order” brings us back to MADness, the author asserts, with a return to the nuclear arms race of the 1950s and ’60s. Fear of enemies, both real and perceived, is once again the driving force in control of arms negotiation.
A well-documented history of the effort to control nuclear weapons.Pub Date: Oct. 21, 2025
ISBN: 9781324051176
Page Count: 432
Publisher: Norton
Review Posted Online: Aug. 29, 2025
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Oct. 1, 2025
Dogged original research and superb narrative skills come together in this gripping account of pitiless evil.
Greed, depravity, and serial murder in 1920s Oklahoma.
During that time, enrolled members of the Osage Indian nation were among the wealthiest people per capita in the world. The rich oil fields beneath their reservation brought millions of dollars into the tribe annually, distributed to tribal members holding "headrights" that could not be bought or sold but only inherited. This vast wealth attracted the attention of unscrupulous whites who found ways to divert it to themselves by marrying Osage women or by having Osage declared legally incompetent so the whites could fleece them through the administration of their estates. For some, however, these deceptive tactics were not enough, and a plague of violent death—by shooting, poison, orchestrated automobile accident, and bombing—began to decimate the Osage in what they came to call the "Reign of Terror." Corrupt and incompetent law enforcement and judicial systems ensured that the perpetrators were never found or punished until the young J. Edgar Hoover saw cracking these cases as a means of burnishing the reputation of the newly professionalized FBI. Bestselling New Yorkerstaff writer Grann (The Devil and Sherlock Holmes: Tales of Murder, Madness, and Obsession, 2010, etc.) follows Special Agent Tom White and his assistants as they track the killers of one extended Osage family through a closed local culture of greed, bigotry, and lies in pursuit of protection for the survivors and justice for the dead. But he doesn't stop there; relying almost entirely on primary and unpublished sources, the author goes on to expose a web of conspiracy and corruption that extended far wider than even the FBI ever suspected. This page-turner surges forward with the pacing of a true-crime thriller, elevated by Grann's crisp and evocative prose and enhanced by dozens of period photographs.
Dogged original research and superb narrative skills come together in this gripping account of pitiless evil.Pub Date: April 18, 2017
ISBN: 978-0-385-53424-6
Page Count: 352
Publisher: Doubleday
Review Posted Online: Feb. 1, 2017
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Feb. 15, 2017
BOOK TO SCREEN
BOOK TO SCREEN
BOOK TO SCREEN
Not so deep, but a delightful tip of the hat to the pleasures—and power—of glamour.
A coffee-table book celebrates Michelle Obama’s sense of fashion.
Illustrated with hundreds of full-color photographs, Obama’s chatty latest book begins with some school portraits from the author’s childhood in Chicago and fond memories of back-to-school shopping at Sears, then jumps into the intricacies of clothing oneself as the spouse of a presidential candidate and as the first lady. “People looked forward to the outfits, and once I got their attention, they listened to what I had to say. This is the soft power of fashion,” she says. Obama is grateful and frank about all the help she got along the way, and the volume includes a long section written by her primary wardrobe stylist, Koop—28 years old when she first took the job—and shorter sections by makeup artists and several hair stylists, who worked with wigs and hair extensions as Obama transitioned back to her natural hair, and grew out her bangs, at the end of her husband’s second term. Many of the designers of the author’s gowns, notably Jason Wu, who designed several of her more striking outfits, also contribute appreciative memories. Besides candid and more formal photographs, the volume features many sketches of her gowns by their designers, closeups on details of those gowns, and magazine covers from Better Homes & Gardens to Vogue. The author writes that as a Black woman, “I was under a particularly white-hot glare, constantly appraised for whether my outfits were ‘acceptable’ and ‘appropriate,’ the color of my skin somehow inviting even more judgment than the color of my dresses.” Overall, though, this is generally a canny, upbeat volume, with little in the way of surprising revelations.
Not so deep, but a delightful tip of the hat to the pleasures—and power—of glamour.Pub Date: Nov. 4, 2025
ISBN: 9780593800706
Page Count: 304
Publisher: Crown
Review Posted Online: Nov. 7, 2025
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 1, 2026
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